Alice Calaba retires at just 24 after being plagued by injuries following her junior world bronze: “Skiing has become part of me”

Just a few days after Federico Romele announced his retirement, another national team talent is calling it quits at just 24.

Born in 2002, Alice Calaba has decided to stop, revealing this evening that her competitive career comes to an end after a 2025/26 comeback season, which she concluded with the Italian championships in Santa Caterina Valfurva at the end of March, more than two and a half years after the layoff that began in March 2023, amid a genuine ordeal of physical problems involving both knees.

The Aosta Valley speed skier had just won the bronze medal in the super-G at the 2023 St. Anton junior world championships, where she had previously also finished 5th in the category downhill. On those slopes, a year earlier, she had achieved what remains her best European Cup result (16th in the downhill), without having the opportunity to go much further, as her talent deserved. She reached the World Cup, but it never became a reality for Calaba, who later also left the national team setup while continuing to receive the support of the C.S. Esercito.

“There are things you do for so long that they become part of you. For me, skiing was that; I gave it my all until a few months ago – Alice wrote on social media to announce her farewell. – It was my world, my childhood dream, my everyday life.

Thanks to skiing, I was able to get to know myself better and better. I experienced so many moments while pursuing my goals, overcame more difficulties than I could ever have imagined, and shared trips, training sessions, disappointments, endless laughter, tears, outbursts, small and great satisfactions… all of this enriched me profoundly.

To the people I met along this wonderful journey, with whom I shared nights and days around the world, goes a truly special thank you: you are the ones who made it all so beautiful. And then there are the people who have always supported, accompanied, helped and encouraged me, and who continued to believe in me even when it was difficult for me to do so myself: thank you from the bottom of my heart.

I take with me many lessons, and in my heart the people who shared this part of my life with me. These were intense years, full of life. I leave this small yet great world with gratitude and cannot wait to discover others.”